The Crew
by Emily RD
Summary: There's no end to the distance and hardships high school student Naruto Uzumaki would go for his loved ones. But maybe this time he took it too far. Naruto gets the help of his friends and tries to convince himself that what he is doing is wrong, but for all the right reasons. Will the boy who never backs down from anything follow through ths time?


Kushina was reading a magazine about plants and how to take care of them wondering what kind of dark magic the people in the pictures did to have gardens as beautiful as the ones she was seeing when she was pulled out of her thoughts at the sound of a door being slammed. It was her son arriving from school.

Again in a bad mood? Come on, Naruto Of course, Minato was at work, Naruko in after school activities, so the only one left was her hyperactive sixteen year-old son.

That same morning, Kushina had received a call from Naruto's teachers telling her that his behavior had drastically changed for the worse, as he fell asleep almost every class, often escaped school grounds, and entered physical fights with Sasuke Uchiha. To top it all, his grades had dropped to the floor.

Well, he was never the best apple in the tree. She remembered thinking as the news were delivered to her.

They even told her that this change appeared to come out of nowhere about a month ago.

Kushina Uzumaki was never one to have a great temper, so she got considerably angry before remembering that their financial problems had started relatively close to that time. Maybe he was upset about that? The company that her husband worked for told their employees that they were having budget shortage, so they would cut on the worker's salary and probably reduce personal. Minato had unfortunately suffered the reduction in his salary, and was on the line of getting fired. This was something they hadn't discuss with their children since they didn't want to worry them, but she knew that suddenly having less meals and not being able to afford things they could before definitely was something at least Naruto wouldn't let pass under the table. He could be an idiot most of the time, but he was very observant of his loved ones and their emotions; it was as if he almost sensed what was going on.

Maybe it was a good time to have a talk with her son. Knowing him, he was probably acting like that because he was upset not about himself, but about how the three of us felt. She felt so proud about having a son with a heart as big as Japan itself, but at the same time she worried about him being irrational at times and the troubles he could get into trying to help.

Her worries became a reality when she saw Naruto standing in the middle of the living room with sadness written all over his face. He tried to change his demeanor as soon as he saw her, but of course he couldn't fool his own mother. Kushina's eyes softened and she felt a pang of pain in her heart, before putting on her best smile and greeting him sweetly.

"Welcome home, Naruto! Son, did something happen? Oh, I know!" she said lifting a finger. "Was it Sakura? I always knew that girlfriend of yours was sketchy. She was too good, too suspicious." His mother continued without even letting the boy speak. Not like he wanted to, anyways.

The blond stood hesitant for a couple of seconds. How is it that mothers always know? he thought without being able to look her in the eye. He reminded himself that he had to pretend better, if he didn't want her to figure out something else apart from the matter just mentioned was obviously wrong.

"Yeah, mom" He admitted. "Sakura and I broke up this morning. Before class she came and told me that it was best if we broke up because she didn't feel comfortable in the relationship anymore" at least out of everything, that much was true.

"And can you explain to me the reason why that girl doesn't feel comfortable with you? Because I don't see it." The woman in front of him questioned with incredibility in her voice.

Here comes the hard part

"You say that because you're my mother. Besides, she said it was because she knows Hinata likes me and she couldn't bear to date me knowing her friend loved me more than she could. She said she loved me too, but maybe she overestimated her feelings." He explained quickly as if trying to get over the topic as soon as possible.

The redhead woman couldn't control her face which inevitably produced a gesture of incredulity, surprise and confusion. Partly because the story wasn't very convincing, as they had been dating for almost a year now and breaking up for that sole reason seemed highly unlikely, but mainly because her son almost never told her if he was feeling down in anyway, since he sais he didn't want to create more problems than the ones we already had. Naruto was the kind of boy that would carry the weight of three worlds in his shoulders and hide it so well that no one would know. After she processed the information, Kushina tried to give him the most sensible answer, and the one that contained the less insults to the pink haired girl that had made her son so happy for months and now broke his precious heart.

It was then when she noticed something in Naruto's neck, something that wasn't there before. He was wearing a necklace, it was a simple chain, but very obviously made of gold. She didn't remember having given him something like that, and they sure couldn't afford it with their current situation. The only explanation she could think about was that maybe it was a gift from one of his friends, since his birthday had been quite recently. When she asked him about it, he dismissed it quickly saying that it was in fact a gift that Gaara had made him. Kushina didn't question it any further since she knew the Sabaku No family had a solid economical situation. Or at least that is what she could see via the children, because whenever she saw the three siblings, they screamed 'expensive' with the things they wore. Especially the girl, Temari, who dressed with clothes that she knew were of ridiculous prices. Naruto's mother suddenly repaired on the fact that she had gotten lost in thought and looked at her son again, who appeared a little bit uncomfortable.

"Well, I'm glad you have such good friends. But still, I'm sorry for what happened with Sakura, Naruto. She'll realize the mistake she made soon enough." She smiled.

"Mom, if I'm completely honest I don't wanna talk about that right now. Truth is, I want to distract myself a little bit if I can, you know? Clear my head. So I'm gonna go have lunch with Kankuro in the mall." He scratched his head before letting the next phrase out of his mouth. "I know I'm in no place to ask because I haven't been doing well in school lately, and I also know that right now we're a sort of short in money, but do you think you can give me a little bit to go eat? I swear I'll pay you back faster than you can say 'give me that money!'" he said the last part with a smile.

"Kankuro? I didn't know that you two were friends; I thought you were just classmates. Are you close now?" she asked somewhat confused.

"He's actually a year older than us, but we became friends through his brother Gaara, you know, the one who gave me the chain for my birthday."

"Of course I do! I remember you two becoming close a couple of years ago."

"Yeah, he's a great friend. So mom, about the lunch…" he rushed somewhat uncomfortable. At this particular moment he didn't feel all too good, but he didn't have any choice, did he?"

"Ah yeah, the money" she replied going to the couch where she had left her purse. "Lately I've been hearing the word 'money' a lot more than I'd like too" Kushina said maybe a little bit too loud. "I guess I can give you some, I'm not about to let my son not eat with his friends if I can do something about it. How much do you need?"

"About five thousand yen should be enough…" he trailed off.

"Sure. Five thousand yen. But if you don't spend it all remember to give it back."

"I will, and I'll also repay you. It's a promise, mom." Naruto smiled. "We're going to the Barbeque that Shikamaru, Ino and Chōji always go to. You know, the one a floor above Ichiraku Ramen." He added trying to sound as convincing as he could.

She stared at him for a second, nodded, and handed him the money.

"Here, have six thousand just in case, things are always more expensive than they look. Be safe and don't come back too late, okay? I'll tell your dad where you went so he doesn't worry." A more amused gesture appeared in her face. "If you do anything crazy I'll know, mothers always know." She finished winking at him and hitting him playfully in the shoulder.

"Yes, mom" Naruto replied with that characteristic tone of annoyed teenager. "I'll be back before it gets dark. I'll go leave my backpack in my room and I'm off." He did as he said and grabbed the keys of the apartment from the entrance.

The boy opened the door with his heart beating out of his chest already, and he hadn't even left the building.

"Take care, Naruto! Have fun! Oh, and if you come across Sakura tell her to go fuck herself!"

"Mom! Don't yell those kinds of things out loud. But sure, bye." The fact that Sakura broke up with him was not a lie, so it still hurt him hearing about it.

He closed the door and didn't look back.

When Naruto arrived to the mall and as he was going up the stairs, he saw Ichiraku Ramen with his familiar owner and daughter attending people as usual. The only thing he could do at the moment was pray to every deity out there that he didn't find anyone who could recognize him. As he got close to the sports store he was supposed to meet with Kankuro, his head started pounding heavily; his heart was a hundred miles per hour and if it beat any faster it would surely have caused him a heart attack. Ok, scratch that, as soon as he saw the radiant smile of the brunet who was standing in the spot he said he would be, his heart stopped; he was definitely dying.

"Uzumaki! You're finally here. You had me waiting little fucker" The older boy said playfully as soon as the other one got close.

"Yeah, sorry I'm late, I got lost in the path of life" he answered while bringing two fingers to one of his eyes as if he had an eye patch.

Both laughed at the reference to their math teacher, but Naruto only did so half heartedly.

"Oh for God's sake, I'm sure if Kakashi wasn't our teacher, our average grade wouldn't be so mediocre." Kankuro said as his laughter died down.

"You're right. How many hours of math do we even have a week? Like four? I don't even remember when the last time we had more than two was. He's always late and sometimes doesn't even come to class at all." He relaxed a little. "But you know, not that complain."

The two of them continued to make fun of the teachers, starting from Kakashi, passing through Asuma and Kurenai's obvious fling, to principal's Tsunade's enormous boobs. The mood had gone up, but then suddenly Kankuro decided it was time to talk business, so he stopped joking.

"Hey man, I'm going to the bathroom. Not to sound gay or anything, but come with me." The boy said with a serious tone.

Naruto blinked rapidly and took a few seconds to answer. "Yeah, let's go" he replied, his heart picking up on the pace it had had before they started joked around.

The way Kankuro approached the matter once they arrived to the empty bathrooms made the blond realize that this had definitely not been the first time his friend had done this.

"So, did you bring the money?"

"Here it is. And you brought everything, right? It's complete." He said not being able to stop his voice from faltering a bit. He breathed in.

"Of course. Hey, just because I'm in the game doesn't mean I play dirty. Am I right?"

"Yeah, then there you go" Naruto replied as his hand firmly reached for his bag and he took about the money his mother had given him earlier. "Five thousand yen, like you said."

"What? Five thousand? Sorry pal, Prices went up. I could have sworn I told you." He paused seeing the dumbfounded look on his friend's face. "Let me tell you something. In this business everything changes constantly, you'll never go anywhere if you're not always on the top of things. It took me some time to figure that out. I'm telling you because I don't want you on any trouble, not now since you've just started." Kankuro advised like he was genuinely worried for Naruto's safety.

"But it seems incredible. Yesterday you told me one thing, and now it's another?"

"You know how it goes-" he corrected himself "well, you'll learn how it goes, things are always more expensive than they look."

The blond boy felt all the air in his lungs suddenly escape his body. He thanked all the deities he knew that he was reclined to the wall so Kankuro couldn't see how his knees failed him. The words resonated in his mind like a scratched CD; 'things are always more expensive than they look'. It had to be a coincidence, there was no way- It just had to be an incredibly terrible coincidence. Naruto had to make great effort to make his words leave his mouth as normal sounding as possible. He asked himself if it was too late to go back like nothing happened and just apologize to his mom for taking so long. Could he then forget that he almost did something like this?

"Yeah, Kiba told me something about that. Thanks for the advice though." He took a breath before continuing. "How much is it now, then?"

"Six thousand."

"Good thing I brought extra money, huh?" the boy tried to say as friendly as he could. Would it be weird if people saw him just dash out of the mall right now?

Yeah, it probably would, so he stayed as still as he could to control his impulse of running away. Kankuro smiled and gave him the backpack with the bags inside. The blond gave him the money and listened nervously as his friend reassured him over and over again that everything was complete and according to what they agreed. He seemed like he really cared.

"Hey man, chill; I trust you" Naruto said now breathing in and feeling slightly better as the worst part was over and the brunet had helped him so much through it.

"No you don't" he shook his head. "You don't trust anyone, no one is your friend, and you're only here to do business. Of course that wouldn't happen with any of us, but if you ever have to contact and external, it's that way man." He said with a very serious tone. "Oh, and be careful. You have to sell it; don't even think about smoking it all, okay? It has happened to me." The older boy chuckled slightly making his friend feel more at ease.

"Yeah, of course." Naruto thought about how he was feeling calmer and calmer every moment, and his heart had returned to its normal pace. "Hey, who are you calling?" He asked when he saw the boy dialing a number in his phone.

He got no answer; instead he waited as Kankuro had a coded conversation with a masculine voice he recognized as Kiba's. Of course it was coded, since it was very dangerous if someone figured out what they were talking about. Seconds later, he ended the call, and a smile in his face didn't last to appear.

"It's done. Kiba and the others will be here any moment so we can celebrate." He communicated as he put the cell phone back in his pants' pockets.

"Celebrate? Kiba and who else? What is this?" He half chuckled but was really intrigued.

"You know, us, _The Crew"_ he replied, referring to the way they and their group of friends called themselves. "Kiba, Temari, Gaara, Ino and Sai; as always."

"Yeah, as always" he said kind of relieved. "But The Boss is not coming, right?"

"No, don't worry about that. Nor the The Bossnor The Colonel. Imagine how weird it would actually be if people saw a bunch of juniors and seniors just hanging around with their math and physics teachers. It would actually be worse if someone from the school was there. Not only it would be suspicious, but what an embarrassment! _"_ He half joked.

"Wouldn't you hang out with your teachers?"

"Would you?"

"Yeah, you're right" He laughed. Before he could notice, they were already outside of the bathroom walking towards the Barbeque he originally told his mom he was going to. His mom. He pushed the thought of aside for a moment and the way she looked at him with such sadness, after he gave her the news that Sakura had broken up with him.

They went down the stairs and searched around for people they knew, there were none. Kankuro looked like an expert in Naruto's eyes, he knew that he may look careless, but in reality he was scanning everything and observing the place to make sure everything was safe and they would be able to get out of there without anyone knowing what had happened between the two.

"Oh! By the way" he spoke after a while when they were in a place where there were not a lot of people. "I spoke with Ino earlier. Kakashi already got her the 'special ones' and she wanted to know if you wanted some to get started." He said that so casually it actually took Naruto a couple of seconds to decipher what he really meant.

"'Special ones'? What's that about?"

"You know, the ones that keep people going at it all night in parties, to have a little bit more fun. Naturally, they accelerate your metabolism which causes you to lose weight. So Ino is pretty popular with those; you get where I'm coming from?"

"Yeah, I get you. Tell her that thanks but no thanks. Since it's her specialty I don't think I want to get involved with that. I don't want her to think I'm trying to steal her customers our something."

"Well, look at that! And it's just the first time you do this! You already sound like quite the expert." He giggled. "Even though it's probably because you've been watching us do this for some time now, maybe you're used to it. Who knows?" He paused for a second. "Man, you were the last one of us to join. We've been waiting for you for a few months now, Temari, Kiba and I for a couple of years." Kankuro finished and scoffed when he saw the surprised expression of his friend.

"Wait, I forgot to ask you. Is it true that you ended things with Sakura? Temari told me that Ino told her that Sakura told her that she broke up with you. You know how things go around in the school; rumors sure fly fast, especially if we're talking about our blondie, huh?" Naruto felt that the entire good mood suddenly dropped at the mention of the topic, despite of the joke his friend made.

"Yeah, she did." Naruto said answering the question. "She founding out I got involved with, you know, drugs. We were in my house alone and I went to the bathroom. When I came back she said she had looked in my school backpack for a lipstick she had left the last time we were together, and she found the bags Kiba had given me that one time so I could test how it'd go.

The brunet couldn't help but laugh at the worst possible outcome the boy could have had at the time. He felt sorry as he knew this was not the time for that kind of reaction, but it was so unfortunate, it was funny.

"Really? Just before sex? Man, what a bummer. What did you have in the bag anyway? Couldn't have been that bad."

Naruto took his phone out of his pocket and started typing something quickly. Then he showed it to Kankuro and the word he read in the screen was one he knew a lot: HEROINE.

"Oh that, huh? Yeah, that's Kiba's specialty. Well it was that bad. Sorry pal, I bet he hadn't even charged you anything. It was testing, right?"

"Yeah, for free. And I quote 'Bruh, bruh, this is going to change your whole life. You'll love it; don't worry that we'll have you back. Let's do it'" Naruto was not one to change moods very easily, but he could have almost forgotten how horrible he felt when he was practically betraying his mom because of all the help and support Kankuro was giving him in something so important.

He decided to dismiss the thought, and the last thing he did before that was a prayer to all the deities he knew that the saying 'mothers always know' didn't prove to be right this time. In his attempt to deviate his mind from the topic, he asked his friend a question that was bothering him.

"But wait, you said something about celebrating, and you know I never back down from a celebration." He smirked making the other boy scoff. "But what exactly are we celebrating?" He asked, a little afraid to know the answer.

"For the love of God, Naruto. I thought it was obvious. We're going to celebrate that you finally completed your first deal. As I told you we've been waiting for you for some time. Now you're one of us, well, you were before, but you know what I mean." Kankuro made a pause to breathe, but didn't wait for the boy in front of him to answer. "Are you listening? You're one of us, and we're going to be the goddamn best gang of drug dealers in this entire fucking city. "The Crew"; picture that, we're going to be great because we have you. You're not stepping down on us, right?"

Naruto had stopped paying attention when, ironically, he was asked if he was still listening. He found himself at a loss for words; he didn't know what to answer. His mind involuntarily started creating images of how his life was going to be from now on. This was a new world for him, so instead of paying attention to the redhead accompanied by a boy with facial temporary tattoos and a pale brunet approaching them, he got lost in his own thoughts.

Was he going to back down? He was doing this for so many reasons; yes, he wanted to continue being with his friends and didn't want to be left alone, but he would finally be recognized in the school as someone important. Now, when he approached Asuma it wouldn't only be to ask him something out the physics lesson, now, he would have a reason to approach girls and forget about Sakura so it wouldn't hurt as much. And then he remembered.

School, even though it was a big part of it, was not his entire life. All those other reasons didn't even come up to be half of why he was getting involved in the drug "business". Everyone knew that drugs were very dangerous so one had to be very careful around them, but there was no denying that they produced a lot of money. And what did his family need right now with the threat of his dad losing his job? Precisely that. Money. He had to help in some way, and this was the only fast one he found after racking his brains to find an alternative. His father worked so hard to bring food to the table and allow them to have a roof above their heads; he felt so powerless when they cut his salary out of the blue like that. His little sister Naruko was still in elementary school and was far too young and innocent to feel what having a hard life was like. And finally, Kushina, his mother. The "Red Habanero", the one who was so kind, but so scary when she got angry. The one who always looked like she knew everything.

He HAD to help them, one way or the other. He cared so much for them, so there was nothing wrong if he successfully managed to keep it in secret, right? Nothing wrong if he managed to not involve them in anything he did, if he used the money for the right reasons, right?

Right.

Suddenly, Naruto came back to reality and saw that their three friends were already by their side, saying something about Ino and Temari being already on their way. He didn't pay attention to that, instead, he turned to Kankuro to give him the answer to the question he had made a few minutes ago. He knew what he was going to say, he had an answer because he had already made a decision.

"Of course man. From now on we're inseparable; The Crew is going to be big. We'll be in everyone's mouths, and for all the good reasons." He winked. He'd done it, he said it. And now, there was no going back.


End file.
